[Way-3-1] Academicus.
IF you please, Theophilus, pray go on, just where you
left off at our last Meeting. For this Mystery seems to be at Daybreak with me; and the
Approach of its Light leaves me no Power to be content without it.

[Way-3-2] Theophilus.
You have seen, that all Nature begins and stands in a magic Birth; and is only a
large Display of its working Power in every kind of Creature. You now want to see farther
into this Mystery, how Eternal Nature begins; and how God, the first, hidden,
imperceptible Cause of all After-Things, manifests himself in the Properties of a visible
and working Nature. Now I would, to the best of my Power, gladly assist you in this
Matter, if I could find out a Way of doing it, by opening in your Heart a Knowledge of
God, of Nature, and yourself, without helping you to a mere Opinion, or increasing
your Thirst after Ideal Speculation. Tell me, therefore, what you propose by the
Gratification of this Desire; or what Effect you expect from such Knowledge, as you here
seek.

[Way-3-3] Academicus.
All that I desire by it is, to strengthen and confirm the Ground on which I stand; that,
seeing the true Philosophy of Religion, I may have nothing to fear from all that Variety
of Attacks which now, more than ever, are made upon it by infidel Reason. I hope,
therefore, it is no vain Curiosity, to desire to enter into the Depth of this Mystery,
since I only desire thereby Strength to resist all the Enemies of Religion.

[Way-3-4] Theophilus.
All this is right, and very well; provided you do but know who, and what, are the great
and powerful Enemies of Religion. But this, perhaps, you do not so well apprehend, as you
may imagine. Your own Reason, born, and bred, and governed, by your own Flesh and Blood,
is the most powerful Enemy of Religion that you have to do with, and whom you have the
most to fear from.

[Way-3-5] The Men of
speculative Reason, whom you seem most to apprehend, are powerless Enemies, that cannot
strike at your Religion with the Strength of a Straw. Did you but rightly see what their
Power is, you would see it as ridiculous, as that of a few Water-Engines trying to quench
the fiery Globe of the Sun: For Reason stands in the same Inability to touch the Truth of
Religion, as the water-engine to affect the Sun. Nay, its Inability is much greater; for
could the Water, thrown from the Engine, be made to reach the Sun, it would have some,
though an insignificant, Effect upon it; but Reason can no more affect the Truth of
Religion, than Nothing can affect Something. If Reason seems to have any
Power against Religion, it is only where Religion is become a dead Form, has lost its true
State, and is dwindled into Opinion; and when this is the Case, that Religion stands only
as a well-grounded Opinion, then indeed it is always liable to be shaken; either by having
its own Credibility lessened, or that of a contrary Opinion increased. But when Religion
is that which it should be, not a Notion or Opinion, but a real Life growing up in God,
then Reason has just as much power to stop its Course, as the barking Dog to stop the
Course of the Moon. For true and genuine Religion is Nature, is Life, and
the Working of Life; and therefore, where-ever it is, Reason has no more Power over
it, than over the Roots that grow secretly in the Earth, or the Life that is working in
the highest Heavens. If therefore you are afraid of Reason hurting your Religion, it is a
Sign, that your Religion is not yet as it should be, is not a self-evident Growth of
Nature and Life within you, but has much of mere Opinion in it.

[Way-3-6] Observe the Word self-evident;
for there lies the Truth of the Matter; for you have no more of the Truth of Religion than
what is self-evident in you. A blind Man may be rich in Notions and Opinions about
the Nature, Power, and Good, of Light; and in this Case, one blind Man may perplex
another, and unsettle his Notions; but when the Light manifests itself, and is become self-evident,
then he is at once delivered from all Uncertainty about it. Now Religion is Light and
Life; but Light and Life can only manifest themselves, and can nowhere be known, but where
they are self-evident.

[Way-3-7] You can know
nothing of God, of Nature, of Heaven, or Hell, or yourself, but so far as all these Things
are self-evident in you. Neither could any of these Things be of any Concern to
you, but because they can all of them be self-evident in you. For the bare History,
or Heresay of any one thing, signifies no more to you, than the Hearsay of any other
thing. And if God and Heaven, Hell and the Devil, the World and the Flesh, were not all of
them self-evident in you, you could have no more Good or Hurt from any Hearsay
about them, than from the Hearsay of pleasant Gardens, and dismal Prisons, in the World of
the Moon.

[Way-3-8] Let it be
supposed, that your ingenious Reason should suggest to you, that there are no Devils or
Hell, and therefore no Occasion to believe that Revelation that gives an Account of them:
in this Case, do but turn to that which is sensible and self-evident in you,
and then you must know, in the same Certainty as you know yourself to be alive, that there
is Wrath, Self-torment, Envy, Malice, Evil-will, Pride, Cruelty, Revenge, &c.
Now say, if you please, there are no other Devils but these, and that Men have no other
Devils to resist; and then you will have said Truth enough, have owned Devils enough, and
enough confessed, that you are in the Midst of them; that you are every-where tempted by
them; and that Flesh and Blood is too weak to resist them, and therefore wants some kind
of Saviour, of so contrary a Nature, as has Power to destroy these Works of the Devil in
you

[Way-3-9] Now this is the
only Knowledge that you can possibly have of an outward Hell, and outward Devils; and this
Knowledge is as self-evident in you as your own Thoughts, and is as near to you as
your own Life. But to see and know an outward Hell, or outward Devils, that are outward
living Creatures, can never be your own Case, till all that is Divine and human in you is
extinguished; and then you will have Knowledge enough, how Hell is a Place, and how the
Devils of Rage, Wrath, Envy, and Pride &c., are living Creatures.

[Way-3-10] Again, let it be
supposed, that your sceptic Reason had brought you into Doubt about the Being and
Providence of God in you: you have no Occasion to consult the Demonstrations which heathen
Philosophers, School Divines, Deists, or Atheists, have produced about it, from the
Existence of Things; all concluding, as well Christians, as Deists and Atheists, that
there must be some eternal first Cause from which all has proceeded.

[Way-3-11] For what a God
is this, that is only proved to be, because something now is, and therefore something must
always have been, an infinite, eternal Something, with infinite Power to bring forth all
that is come into Being? What a God, I say, is this, which the Arian, the Deist,
and the Atheist, is as willing to own as the Christian; and which is as serviceable to the
Cause of Arianism, Deism, Idolatry, and Atheism, as it is to Christianity? For the
Atheist has his omnipotent, eternal, first Cause, as well as all the Disputers for a God.

[Way-3-12] But now, if you
turn from all these idle Debates and Demonstrations of Reason, to that which is sensible
and self-evident in you, then you have a sensible, self-evident Proof of the
true God of Life, and Light, and Love, and Goodness, as manifest to you as your own Life.
For with the same self-evident Certainty, as you know that you think, and are alive, you
know that there is Goodness, Love, Benevolence, Meekness, Compassion, Wisdom, Peace,
Joy, &c. Now this is the self-evident God, that forces himself to be known,
and found, and felt, in every Man, in the same Certainty of Self-evidence, as every Man
feels and finds his own Thoughts and Life. And this is the God, whose Being and
Providence, thus self-evident in us, calls for our Worship, and Love, and Adoration, and
Obedience to him: and this Worship, and Love, and Adoration, and Conformity to the Divine
Goodness, is our true Belief in, and sure Knowledge of, the self-evident God. And
Atheism is not the Denial of a first omnipotent Cause, but is purely and soley nothing
else but the disowning, forsaking, and renouncing the Goodness, Virtue, Benevolence,
Meekness, &c. of the Divine Nature, that has made itself thus self-evident in us, as
the true Object of our Worship, Conformity, Love, and Adoration. This is the one true
God, or the Deity of Goodness, Virtue, and Love, &c., the Certainty of
whose Being and Providence opens itself to you in the self-evident Sensibility of your own
Nature; and inspires his Likeness, and Love of his Goodness, into you. And as this is the
only true Knowledge that you can possibly have of God and the Divine Nature, so it is a
Knowledge not to be debated or lessened by any Objections of Reason, but is as
self-evident as your own Life. But to find or know God in Reality, by any outward Proofs,
or by any thing but by God himself made manifest and self-evident in you, will never be
your Case either here or hereafter. For neither God, nor Heaven, nor Hell, nor the Devil,
nor the World, and the Flesh, can be any otherwise knowable in you, or by you, but by
their own Existence and Manifestation in you. And all pretended Knowledge of any of these
Things, beyond or without this self-evident Sensibility of their Birth within you, is only
such Knowledge of them, as the blind Man hath of that Light, that never entered into him.

[Way-3-13] And as this is
our only true Knowledge, so every Man is, by his Birth and Nature, brought into a certain
and self-evident Sensibility of all these Things. And if we bring ourselves by Reasoning
and Dispute into an Uncertainty about them, it is an Uncertainty that we have created for
ourselves, and comes not from God and Nature. For God and Nature have made that which is
our greatest Concern, to be our greatest Certainty; and to be known by us in the same
Self-evidence, as our own Pain or Pleasure is. For nothing is Religion, or the Truth of
Religion, nothing is good or bad to you, but that which is a self-evident Birth within
you. So that if you call that only God, and Religion, and Goodness, which truly are so,
and can only be known by their self-evident Powers and Life in you, then you are in the
Truth, and the Truth will make you free from all Doubts; and you will no more Fear or
regard any thing that talkative Reason can discourse against it, than against your own
seeing, hearing, or sensible Life. But if you turn from Self-Evidence to Reason
and Opinion, you turn from the Tree of Life, and you give yourself up to
certain Delusion.

[Way-3-14] Wonder not
therefore, my Friend, that though the Mystery under Consideration contains the greatest of
Truths, yet I am unwilling to help you to reason and speculate upon it; for if you attempt
to go farther in it than Self-evidence leads you, you only go so far out of it, or from
it. For the End of this Mystery is not to furnish new or better Matter for Reason and
Opinion, but to bring Man home to that Sensibility, which is self-evident in
himself, and to lead him only by self-evident Principles, to see, and find, and feel the
Difference between true and false Religion in the same Degree of self-evident Certainty,
as he sees and feels the Difference between Fire and Water. This, I say, is the great
Intent of this Mystery, to bring Man into a Sensibility of God and Nature, to know and
feel, that Good and Evil, Life and Death, are a self-evident Growth and Birth of Nature in
Man, according as his Will enters into and works with that which is unchangeably good, or
unchangeably evil, in the Working of Nature. Now as the Workings of Nature are
unchangeable in their Effects, and that which is naturally good or evil, must always be
so; and seeing Mans Life standeth in Nature, and must work with it, must have only
that Good or Evil which is unchangeable in Nature; and seeing his State in Nature, whether
good or evil, is, and can be, only that, which the sensible, self-evident Powers of
his own Life manifest to him; then you see the Fitness and Necessity of your keeping
steadily to that, which is self-evident in you, as the very Tree of Life,
the Criterion of all that Truth and Goodness that belongs to you. Secondly, you see
with what good Reason Jacob Behmen so often tells you, That all that he has
written, was only to help Man to seek and find himself, to see and know his Place
and State in Nature, and how to cooperate with God and Nature in generating a Birth of
Heaven within himself. Thirdly, you may see how you and I should abuse this blessed
Mystery, should we, instead of only and truly seeking and finding its Birth within us,
make it a Matter of Reasoning and Opinion.

[Way-3-15] Academicus.
I have neither Power nor Inclination to object to any thing that you have said. But still
I must desire you to assist me in your own Way, and such as you judge to be suitable to
the Intention of this Mystery. I plainly see, that the whole Ground of Religion lies in
the Knowledge of what God is in himself, as distinct from Nature; what Nature is in
itself; what I have from God, and what I am in and from Nature; and how I am to work with
it, as God himself is and worketh in Nature. For if this Knowledge can be opened in me,
then the Why, and the How, of every Mystery of Redemption must be seen to
the Bottom.

[Way-3-16] Theophilus.
By Nature are meant, all the working, stirring Properties of Life, or all the
various Sensibilities which Life is capable of finding and feeling in itself. And
therefore you need only look at the working Sensibilities of your own Life, the several
Kinds and Ways of feeling and finding your own State, to know by a self-evident
Certainty, what Nature is in itself. And thus also, in the same self-evident Certainty,
you may know, that Nature is not God. For as you find, that Nature is opened in you; that
all its Properties have their Existence in you; and yet that none of these Properties of
Life are their own Happiness, or can make themselves to be happy, full of Peace, Delight,
and Joy, and free from every Want; so you have a full self-evident Proof, that God is not
Nature, but entirely distinct from, and superior to, Nature; and that, as considered in
himself, he is That which alone can make Nature happy, free from Want, and full of
all delightful Satisfaction. And thus you know, not from Hearsay, but from a self-evident
Certainty in yourself, that God, considered as in himself, is the Happiness, the Rest,
the Satisfaction, the Joy, the Fulfilling of all the Properties and
Sensibilities of Nature; and also that Nature, in itself, is that working Life of various
Properties and Sensibilities, which want to be made happy, which reach after
something that they are not, and have not, and which cannot be happy or fulfilled, till
something of an higher Nature than themselves be united with them, that is, the Working of
Nature must be in Want, in Pain, and Dissatisfaction, till God (the Blessing and
Fulfilling of Nature) is manifested, found, and enjoyed in it.

[Way-3-17] Now suppose you
knew no more of what God is in himself, distinct from Nature, and what Nature is as thus
distinguished from God, than is already opened in you, you would know enough to be a Key
to all that which Jacob Behmen speaks of God, and of Nature; and enough also to
show you how to cooperate with God and Nature, in bringing forth a New Birth of the Divine
Life within you. For as soon as you know, that Nature in itself is only a working Life of
various Sensibilities, which wants something distinct from itself, and higher than itself,
to make it happy, then you have a self-evident Certainty of these following Truths; First,
That God, considered as in himself, is the Blessing, the Satisfaction, the Heaven, and
Happiness, of all and every Sensibility of Nature. Secondly, That therefore, as the
Gospel teaches, only the Word, the Light, the Son of God, or Jesus Christ,
can redeem fallen Nature, restore it to its first State of Blessedness in God. Thirdly,
That therefore, as the Gospel teaches, you have but one Thing to do, and that one
Thing absolutely necessary to be done; viz., to deny yourself; that is, to
turn this fallen Nature from itself, from all its own Wills and Workings in the Vanity of
this Life, to give up itself in Faith, in Hunger and Thirst after that Light, Word, Son,
or Jesus Christ of God, who is the Fullness, the Satisfaction, the Joy, and
Blessedness, of all Nature; who alone can turn every Working and Sensibility of Nature
into a Participation of heavenly Satisfaction and Joy. Now what can you desire, or need
you to know of God, of Nature, and the Mystery of Christian Redemption, more than this?
And yet all this is a self-evident Knowledge, born within you as soon as you turn to it.

[Way-3-18] Academicus.
Oh! Sir, you quite transport me with this short, easy, and yet full Explication of so
great a Matter, which has often perplexed me. But now I shall never be at a Loss how to
understand the Distinction between God and Nature, and also the absolute Necessity of it;
which, when rightly known, sets all the Doctrines and Mysteries of Christian Redemption
upon such a Ground as cannot be removed. But still I must beg of you to help me to the
same Self-evidence of the Birth and Generation of the Properties of Nature, as they are
set forth by Jacob Behmen, especially of the Three first Forms, which I perceive to
be the Ground of all; and yet their Birth and Generation, their Union with, and
Distinction from, one another, I do not enough comprehend, as he sets them forth. Thus,
the first Form of Nature is said to be Desire; which is the Ground and
Foundation of all Things. This Desire (the first Property), he saith, is astringing,
drawing, shutting up, compressing, hardening, &c. Now all this is evident
enough; for I have a sufficient Sensibility, that this is the Nature of Desire; that, in
its spiritual Way, it attracts, draws, compresses, and would shut up, or inclose, &c.
But then, it is immediately said, that the Second Property is Attraction, Drawing,
Sting, and Motion, &c. Now if the First is Attraction and Drawing,
how can the Second be different from it, and yet be Attraction and Drawing?

[Way-3-19] Theophilus.
The Desire is not one Property, but is in itself all the Properties of Nature; it
is the Ground in which they all dwell, and the Mother out of which they are all born: So
that all that is said of the Three First Forms of Nature, is only so much said of Three
Forms or Properties of the Desire. For the Desire is not the first Property of Nature; but
every Property hath all that it hath in and from the Desire. The First Property of the
Desire, of that which is the Peculiarity of its Nature, as distinguished from the Second,
is, to compress, inclose, shut up, &c., whence cometh Thickness, Darkness,
Hardness, &c. But no sooner does the Desire begin to compress, shut up, but it
brings forth its own greatest Enemy, and the highest Resistance to itself: For it cannot compress
or thicken, but by drawing or attracting; but drawing and attracting is quite
contrary to shutting up, or compressing; because drawing or attracting is Motion,
and every Motion is contrary to shutting up or compressing together.

[Way-3-20] And thus your
Difficulty is removed: Attraction or Drawing is rightly ascribed to the Desire, and
rightly called its Second Property, because it is born of it; and yet is directly contrary
to that which is the Desire's First Property or Intention; viz., to compress,
to hold in Stillness, &c.

[Way-3-21] Now as these Two
Properties are Two Resistances, not in Two different Things, but are one and the same
Thing in this Contrariety in and to itself, as they are inseparable, generate each other,
are equal in Strength, and can neither of them overcome the other, so as to go one Way,
but each of them stops the other in the same Manner; and seeing this Desire cannot cease
to be these Two contrary Things; viz. a Holding-fast, and Moving-away,
a Shutting-in, and a Going-out, both in the same Degree of Strength; neither
able to shut up, or to go out, nor able to cease from either; these Two Contrarieties
become a whirling Anguish in itself, and so bring forth a Third Property of Nature.
And in these Three Properties lies the true Ground of all Sensibility of Life, and also of
every created Thing. Matter, Motion, Darkness, Fire, and every natural Power or Quality of
any thing, has its Beginning from them. Considered in themselves, they are the working
Powers of that great and strong creaturely Life, which cannot be broken, because it begets
itself, and every Property is included in, and generates each other. It is a Band or Knot
of Life, that can never be loosed; nor is capable of Annihilation, because it is a Birth
of eternal Nature, which is as unchangeable as God himself. And as it arises from no
outward Thing, but is generated in and from itself, its Work is eternal, and can never be
made to cease. For as one Property has no Power over the other, but that of forcing
it to exist; as one Property does not weary the other, but always gives Strength to it; so
there can be no Cessation of their working, but they must do, as they do, to all Eternity.

[Way-3-22] Now the Life of
these Three Properties is a Life of Three contrary Wills, equally strong and powerful
against each other; and therefore is a Life of the highest Disquiet, Torment, and Anguish,
full of the most horrible Sensibility. It is a Life that can feel nothing but its own
tearing Contrariety, that reigns within it. And this is the Life of Nature separated from
God; it is the Life of Hell, and the Devils; and is that Life of dark, raging Distraction,
which every living Creature must be in, whose first Properties of Life are not softened
and quieted, either by the Light of God, or the Light of this World, dwelling and making
Peace in them. And he that will only seek to his Reason, to cool the Flame of these raging
first Properties of Life, acts as wisely as he, whose House being on Fire, would only have
it extinguished, by reading a Lecture upon the Nature of Water to it.

[Way-3-23] And now, Sir,
you have seen plainly enough the Birth, Nature, and Difference, of these three first
Properties. But let it be supposed, that you have no feeling, or inward Sensibility, of
these Three Properties in the Manner they have been here described, according to Jacob
Behmen; yet you have no Reason to be troubled at it, or put your Brain upon the Rack
how to conceive it, or fear that you must want the Benefit of this Knowledge, till you
have it as above described; for you have in yourself a most self-evident Proof, that the
Thing is really so; and that Desire hath all that in it which he so deeply
declares, from its first Seed, or Root.

[Way-3-24] For it is a
Thing self-evident to you, that every Desire, as such, is in itself a restless Torment;
that it has Pain, Disquiet, and Anguish, in itself; and, as to itself, consists of nothing
else. Now, whether you can, with Jacob Behmen, divide this restless, anguishing
Desire into its Three essential Parts, of which it consists, matters not, as to the
Reality of the Thing itself; for you have Sensibility enough, that the Desire is made up
of Pain and Anguish, till the thing desired is obtained: and therefore you have all the
Certainty and Benefit of this Knowledge; and it serves the same End, as if you knew the
Ground of it with the same Exactness as he has set it forth.

[Way-3-25] You have
yourself for a Proof, that Desire and Pain begin together; and this is a full Proof of
what was said; viz. that Desire begins with Two Properties, that resist and
strive against one another. Again, you have the same Evidence in yourself, that the
Desire, left to itself, that is, without the least Glimpse of any Possibility of having
that which it desires, is a Degree of Hell, and quite intolerable to itself: and this is a
self-evident Proof of what was said; viz. that the Third and last Property of the
Desire, is that whirling Anguish, brought forth by the Two first Properties: For these
Three Properties are the Whole of the Desire; it has nothing more in it. And when your
Desire cannot cease, and yet has nothing but itself, without the least Mixture or Feeling
of Hope in it, then you have a full Self-evidence of all that which the Desire is,
in its Three essential, inseparable Properties, and that strictly according to the Letter
of Jacob Behmen.

[Way-3-26] Now all that is
Nature, or natural Life within you, is only the working of Desire in this painful State;
and that which can set this painful Life at Rest in you, is so much of God, or the
Divine Nature, manifested in you, and changing your restless Properties of Life into Peace
and Happiness. And as the working Properties of Desire are your natural Life, so the same
working Properties are the Life of eternal Nature; from whence, as out of the Womb, your
natural Life is brought forth, and hath neither more nor less in it than that which is in
eternal Nature.

[Way-3-27] And if the
working Properties, which constitute the life of eternal Nature, could be supposed to be
without God in them, eternal Nature would be a mere eternal Hell: But as the eternal
Desire, with all its working Properties, is brought forth by the magic Power of the Divine
Will, only for this End, that the holy Deity may manifest a Heaven of Glory in them; so
eternal Nature always was, and always must be, a Kingdom of Heaven, or the unchangeable
Manifestation of the invisible God in an outward Sensibility of Life, Happiness, Glory,
and Majesty.

[Way-3-28] Academicus.
I am fully satisfied as to this Point; and all that you have said, has the Evidence of
Light at Noon-day. And I hope you will now go on in the Birth of the Four remaining
Properties; and show me, in the same Degree of Evidence, how these Three Properties bring
forth the Four following ones, which turn Nature into a Kingdom of Heaven

Way-3-29] Theophilus.
These Three Properties of Nature cannot bring forth the Four following ones. They can
bring forth nothing but themselves to all Eternity, nor can ever be anything else in
themselves, but what they were at first. Nature can rise no higher than this painful
State; and its painful working Contrariety must always be the Ground of all Life, and all
Sensibility of Life. For if (1.) This Shutting-up, or Compressing; and (2.) This
Resistance to it; and (3.)This Whirling arising from both, was ever to cease, there Life,
and all Sensibility, must cease with them; and therefore these Three Properties must
always do as they do, as the only possible Ground of every Kind and Degree of creaturely
Life, both in Heaven, and on Earth.

[Way-3-30] But if Life is
to be happy, something else must come into them, not to destroy their natural Working, but
to make every Contrariety in them a strife of Joy, and delightful Sensibilities. Thus,
(1.) Compressing, or Shutting-up, must find itself only to compress and keep in Light and
Love; (2.) the Attraction or Drawing-motion, must find itself to be the Drawing and Motion
of Love; and, (3.)the whirling Anguish must whirl still, but as a Transport of Joy
unavoidably brought forth from the Strife of Love in the Two Properties of which it is
born. And thus Nature remains in its full Strength; it compresses, it attracts, and it
whirls, as it did at first; and nothing is lost, or taken from it, but its Hatred, Wrath,
and Misery. Now here you are to observe, that every Thing or Creature, either in Heaven,
Hell, or this World, hath its Substance, or all that is Substantiality in it, solely from
these Three First Properties of Nature. The creaturely Substance of an Angel, a Devil, or
a dead Flint, all stand in these Three First Forms of Nature. And all the Difference
betwixt high and low, spiritual and material, in the Creatures, arises from their
different Participation of the Four following Forms of Nature. But the Four following
Forms cannot exist, or manifest themselves, but in the Three first; and therefore the
Three First are, and must be, as well in the highest as in the lowest of Creatures: They
are the first Something, or Substantiality of Nature, in which the Light,
and Love, and Spirit of God could manifest itself; for Spirit cannot work without
something to work in and upon, and in which it may be found; nor could Light shine,
unless there was something in Nature thicker than itself, to receive and
reflect it: and therefore, Thickness or Darkness is, and must be, as eternal as the
visible or shining Light. Darkness is so far from being a mere Negation,
or only an Absence, of the Light, that it is the first and only
Substance, and the Ground of all the possible Substantiality in Nature, and the
substantial Manifester of Light itself, which could have no Visibility, Shine, or Colour,
but in and through, and by the Substantiality of Darkness or Thickness. This Darkness,
Thickness, or Substantiality, is not co-existent with, or independent of, God, but is the compressing,
astringing, thickening Work of the first Property of the Desire; which Desire comes
eternally from God, only as a magic Birth from the Will of the Deity, which willeth to
come out of its Hiddenness into an outward Visibility of a working Life. And therefore the
Desire is the Beginning of Nature; it compresseth and thickeneth. But what does it
compress and thicken? Why, Nothing but itself; viz. its own Three Properties. And
these Three Properties thus brought forth, tied and bound in one another, are, from
Eternity to Eternity, all the Substantiality and Thickness, that is or ever can be in
Nature, or any Creature, from the Highest to the Lowest. And they are thus brought forth
in this indissolvable Band in and by the Desire, that the invisible Light and Life of the
hidden Deity may have its Something to move and shine in; his hidden Spirit have
Something to work and manifest itself in; his hidden Love have Something into
which it may give itself; and his hidden Life have Something in which it can open itself
in a Variety of Births of Life. And this Something is the working compressing
Desire, which includes in itself, (1.) A continual Thickening, which is Darkness and
Substantiality: (2.) Motion or Resistance to this Thickening, which is the Ground of all
Sensibility; And, (3.) A restless State of Whirling from these two Properties, which is
the very Nature and Power of Life. And thus these three Properties of the Desire, are that
sufficientSomething, in which the Deity, by entering into it, can manifest
his hidden Power in all the Substances and working Properties of Nature, by turning them
all in their different Workings into an endless Variety of delightful Forms and
Sensibilities of the creaturely Life.

[Way-3-31] Now this first
Thickness, Darkness, or Substantiality, brought forth in the Desire, though it is not
Matter, as Matter is seen and found in this World; yet these two Things must be affirmed
of it; First, That it stands in the same Place, answers the same Ends, and is
distinguished from Light and Spirit in the eternal World, just as Matter in this World
stands distinguished from the Light and Spirit of this World. Secondly, That all
the Darkness, Thickness, and Matter of every Kind in this World, is nothing else in
itself, but the first Thickness, Darkness, and Substantiality in the Desire, brought down
by various Steps into such Kinds of Materiality as are here to be seen. Look at what Kind
of Materiality you will in this World; it is, in its whole Nature, nothing else but the
Darkness or Thickness of the eternal World, brought into a farther Degree of Thickness and
Compression. And now we are come to see the true Ground; (1.) How the Angels could destroy
their Kingdom, or lose all the Light and Happiness of Heaven in it: And, (2.) How also,
their wasted, spoiled, darkened Habitation in the divided Properties of Nature, could be
turned, and created by God, as it is, into this new Form of a material World.

[Way-3-32] The first Three
Properties of Nature were never to have been seen or known, as they are in themselves, by
any Creature; their Thickness, Strife, and Darkness, were brought forth by God, in Union
with the Light, and Glory, and Majesty of Heaven; and only for that End, that the holy
Deity might be made manifest in them. And therefore their own Nature, as they are in
themselves, without God in them, could only then be first known, when the Angels turned
their Desire backwards to search and find the Ground and Original of Life, which could not
be found, till these Properties were found, in which the original Ground of Life lay hid.
This turning of their Desire into the Origin of Life, was their whole turning from the
Light of God; and therefore they found themselves where they had turned their Desire; that
is, in the Centre of Nature; viz. in the first Properties of Nature, which is the
Dark Centre, or Ground of Life, which never should have been known or manifest to any
Creature. For by the Centre of Nature, or the Dark Centre, you are always to
understand these three first Properties; which, when without or separate from the Light
and Goodness of the Deity in them, are in themselves only the Thickness, and Rage, and
Darkness, of an omnipotent Compressing, and omnipotent Resistance to it, and
omnipotent Whirling from these two omnipotent Contrarieties. I call them all
omnipotent, because they cannot be stopped, but do all that they would; and though they
are contrary to one another, yet each of them gives Strength to the other; so that the
Omnipotence of the one, is the Omnipotence of the other. And this is the boundless,
incessant, strong Rage, Darkness, and Strife, of the hellish Life, which only is that,
which these Three properties of Nature, when left to themselves, can feel or find. Now the
Angels, which turned their Desire into the Centre of Nature, fell into the Life and
working Power of these Three Properties; they felt nothing else in themselves, but these
Properties, they had no other Will or Power of Working, but as these Properties worked;
and therefore, as living and active Creatures, they could only live, and act, and
cooperate, or unite with that Ground of Nature without them, which was the same and
one with their own Nature; and therefore, all that they could do, was to stir up,
awaken, call forth, and act with that Thickness and Darkness, and Strife, that was hidden
in Nature, just as the Toad, in a fine Garden, only sucks the Poison that is hid in a good
Herb. So the fallen Angels, though in Heaven, having only the Centre of Nature in
themselves, could only find and work with that Centre and Root of Darkness, on which the
heavenly Glory stood. But from this Power which they had of working in the Centre of
Nature, hence came forth a dark, wrathful Substantiality, separated from the Light
and Glory of the holy Deity; and thus a new Kind of Substantiality appeared in
their Kingdom; and their outward Habitation was like their inward Life; viz. a Manifestation
of Nature fallen from God. And here now, you clearly see, how the First Thickness or
Compression of the First Property of Nature, which was only the hidden Substantiality
of the Light and Glory of Heaven, came into a more outward State, and made its
first Approach or Step towards Matter, as you now see it. For there was now a Thickness,
a Darkness, and Hardness, which never had been before; for the Light being lost,
then the First Property of Nature lost its beatified State of Meekness, Transparency, and
spiritual Fluidity; and became stiff, rigid, dark, and hard; and this, as I said, was its first
Step or Descent towards the Hardness and Darkness of the Matter of this World, till it
came to be Earth and Stones, by the creating Power of God. And thus it came to pass, as Moses
speaks, that Darkness was upon the Face of the Deep. A State, that had no
Possibility of Existence, till the Sin of Angels had manifested the hidden Centre of
Nature, in the Working of its Three Properties, without the Light of God in them.

[Way-3-33] Now as a new
Thickness of Darkness, Hardness, or Substantiality, was manifested by the strong working
Powers of the Angels in the Centre, or the first Properties of fallen Nature; so God, to
manifest his Wisdom and Goodness towards this fallen Nature, took all these Properties in
their own working Way; and made them in their own way of Working, to stop and overcome the
Evil that was brought forth by them. For the Will of God, joining with the wrathful Astringency
of the first compressing Property of Nature, became the Divine Fiat, which
increased this compacting Property to such a Degree, as created or compacted the darkened
Substantiality into a Globe of Earth and Stones. And this same Divine Fiat, or
creating Power, which coagulated the Grossness into Earth and Stones, compressed or
coagulated all that was substantial, or belonged to Substantiality through their whole
Kingdom, as well the heavenly as the earthly Part of it; so that all their Kingdom, as to
its Substantiality, lost its Spirituality, and entered into a new created or compacted
State of Thickness, as well the spoiled as the unspoiled Part of their Kingdom. And as
soon as this was done, the Angels lost all their Power in it, and over it. They could
kindle no more Wrath in its heavenly Part, nor make any Use of that which they had
spoiled, because all was shut up together in this new Compaction, with which the
Spirituality of their Nature could have no Communication. And so they were left prisoners
in their own Chains of Darkness, unable to stir up Wrath anywhere but in themselves. All
this was done in the first Day of the Creation, when the Fiat of God compressed or
created their whole Kingdom into a Heaven and Earth. Hence it is; viz. from a
Compaction of their whole Kingdom into a new-created Heaven and Earth, that all Things in
this World, all its Elements and Stars, are a Mixture of Good and Evil, have something of
the Goodness of Heaven, and something of the Wrath and Evil of Hell in them. Hence is the
great Variety of metallic Ores and precious Stones in the Earth; the good and bad
Qualities in Fire, Air, and Water. It is because the Divine Fiat, or compacting
Power, came at once in the utmost Swiftness upon their whole Kingdom, as the Good and Evil
stood in Strife against each other, and compressed all into a State of Cessation and
Conjunction with one another, as in the Prison of this new-created Materiality. And thus
the heavenly and hellish Part of their Kingdom, Light and Darkness, Fluidity and Hardness,
Meekness and Wrath, Good and Evil, were all shut up together in the same sudden
Compaction; in which they lay, as in a State of Death, till the Divine Fiat should
awaken a Life in it.

[Way-3-34] Now the Three
First Properties of Nature; the First, a Shutting up; the Second, a Running
out; and the Third, a Whirling; were by the Divine Fiat, in the three first Days of
the Creation, become the Ground of an earthly, a watery, and airy Materiality, all
according to the working Nature of the Three Properties; and all of them having Something
of an heavenly Nature shut up in them, which wanted to be delivered from its Bondage.
Hence this threefold Materiality of Earth, Water, and Air, became a Subject fit for the
Birth of the fourth Property of Nature. And therefore, on the fourth Day of the Creation,
the Divine Fiat kindled in this anguishing Materiality, out of that very Fire
and Light that was compacted and hid in it, the fourth Property of Nature (the
eternal Fire), as a Globe of Fire and Light, which was to stand as an Out-birth of the
eternal Fire, in the midst of this new-created Materiality, and become the Opener of all
the astral Life and Light in this World. And as the eternal Fire, the fourth Property of
eternal Nature, is not a movable Thing that can change its Place, but must be always in
the Place of its Birth, standing forever, as a Birth, in the Midst of the seven
Properties, forever changing the three first Properties of Nature into the three last
Properties of the Kingdom of Heaven; so the Sun, the true Out-birth of the eternal Fire,
and having the same Birth and Office in this material World, as the eternal Fire hath in
eternal Nature, is not, cannot be, a movable Thing, or be in any other Place
in this World, than where it is; but is, and must be, the Centre or Heart of this whole
System, ever separating the three first Properties of this material World, from the three
that follow, and ever changing the three first Forms of material Wrath into the three
following Forms of terrestrial Life, Light, and all delightful Sensibilities; in strict
Conformity to that, which the eternal Fire does in eternal Nature, changing the Root, or
first Properties of Nature, into a Kingdom of God, and heavenly Glory. For the Sun
is not a Body of Fire brought into the Place where it is; but the kindled Place is
its Body and Birth; and therefore it is as immovable as Place is, and must be as it is;
viz. a Place giving forth Fire and Light till all material Nature is dissolved. The
Place is kindled, not by any foreign Fire, but thus: In the first Compaction of the whole
angelic Kingdom into this new Materiality, the good and bad Part, that is, the spoiled and
unspoiled Substantiality of their whole Kingdom, was shut up in this new Compression or
Materiality, in one and the same State of Death. Secondly, In the Beginning of the
Creation, God, said, "Let there be Light," and there was Light; not a shining
Light, for that came first from the Birth of the Sun, but a Power or Virtue of heavenly
Light, not yet in a visible, material Shine, but as an uncreated
Power of Light, entering into this whole Materiality, to stir up, and awaken the good Part
of the heavenly Substantiality, that was shut up in the Compaction of this new
Materiality.

[Way-3-35] Without these
two Things, material Nature must have continued in its Darkness, and no fourth Form of
Fire could ever have come forth in it. But from these two Things, viz. the heavenly
Substantiality, stirred up by the Power of Light entering into it, the three first
Properties of Darkness were brought into a mere anguishing State; from whence, by the
Divine Fiat, the fourth Form of material Nature kindled itself, as a Fire, and broke
forth in the Place of the Sun, and must be ever burning and flaming in the Midst of
the material System; because it is born of the three first Properties of Darkness, and
brings forth the three last Properties of Light, and Life, and the Joy of Nature; and
therefore must always be in the Midst of the six Properties of Nature, itself making the
Number to be seven. And thus the Sun, as the fourth Form of Nature, must always stand in
the Midst of the whole material System. And this proved, not as Copernicus has
proved it, from reasonable Conjectures, and outward Arguments, but from the internal
Nature of its Birth, the first Root from which it proceeds, and the absolute Impossibility
of its being otherwise. And thus it is, that the Truth and Depth of Nature is opened by
the Spirit of God, in the Mystery made known to our illiterate Shoemaker. And thus you
have a short Sketch, how this World came to be as it is. It is descended as an Out-birth
of the eternal World, and all the seven Properties of eternal Nature work in it, as they
work in Eternity; and the Eternity is manifested in the temporary Working of a new World,
which is only to stand in this State of Thickness or Compaction for a time, till the
Goodness of God towards fallen Nature has been sufficiently manifested thereby.

[Way-3-36] For as this
material System of Things may, in a good Sense, be said to be an unnatural State,
occasioned by the Disorders which the Fall of Angels brought into Nature; and as it had no
Beginning, but from the Will of God, commanding the first Property of Nature to coagulate
and compress their disordered Kingdom into a new Thickness or Materiality, only as a
Remedy to stop, remove, and overcome the Evil in Nature; so when this Remedy shall have
had its Trial, and the Will of God shall no longer will this compressing together; then
all that has been brought together by it, must fall back again into its first Eternity.
And then, without any Possibility of being otherwise, every Birth in this World, that
belongs to the Root or Centre of Nature, and has worked with it, must fall down into that
eternal Abyss of Darkness, on which the Light of God forever stands, unknown to it. And
every Life that is born of Heaven, and has worked with it, must ascend into the Kingdom of
God, or Abyss of Divine Glory and Majesty.

[Way-3-37] Oh Academicus!
Look now (whilst these Thoughts are alive in you) at worldly Greatness, fleshly Wisdom,
and earthly Schemes of Happiness; and tell me, if you can, what a Nothingness, what a
Folly and Delusion, there is in them? Look again at the Apostle's Pilgrim, abstaining from
worldly Lusts, desiring to know nothing but Christ, and him crucified; living in the
Spirit of Prayer, and Thirst after God; striving in every thing after the fullest
Conformity to the Tempers, Spirit, Life, and Behaviour of Christ in this World; and then
tell me, whether Heaven and Earth, God and Nature, and all that is great, and wise, and
happy, does not call upon you to be this Pilgrim.

[Way-3-38] Academicus.
Truly, Sir, I enough see, that all worldly Wisdom, and ambitious Views of a Glory of Life
in the Things and Concerns of this World, are no better than vain Attempts to be blessed
and happy from the Ruins of the angelic Kingdom. For this World is only a Thickness and
Materiality of the bestial Life, built upon the Ground of Hell; that is, upon the first
Properties of fallen Nature, brought into a harder, more compacted State of Existence than
they have in Hell, and kindled into an astral, terrestrial, bestial Life, by the Power of
the Sun. The bestial Life, therefore, is the highest Good and Happiness in it; and the
Creatures of this World have nothing that they seek for further in it. But Man, being not
created for it, but by Sin fallen into it, is the only Creature that makes an unnatural
use of it, and seeks for that in it, and by it, which cannot be found in it. Man, having
been wise, great, and happy in his Creation, though they are all lost, has yet some
remaining Sensibility of them, though fallen into a World, that cannot help him to them.
Hence it is, that he would be wise, and great, and happy in a World, that has no Happiness
but for Beasts; and can only help Man to know, that he is poor and miserable,and banished
from his true native Country.

[Way-3-39] But, instead of
learning this one Lesson of Truth, from the World he is in, which is all the Wisdom,
Greatness, and Happiness, that can be had from it; he gives himself up to a Wisdom that is
Foolishness, a Greatness that is all Meanness, and a Happiness that begins and ends in
Torment and Delusion. Would you see all his Greatness, Wisdom and Happiness united, the
Sum total of earthly Glory! It is, when he has in his Cap the Feathers of some Birds,
wears a painted Ribband, laced Clothes, is called by some new Name, and drawn from Place
to Place by a Number of Beasts. Now, poor, and mean, and unnatural as this Fiction of
earthly Glory is; yet this is the powerful Idol, that carries all before it! that destroys
all Sense of Goodness, and Divine Virtue! and keeps the Heart of Man so earnestly devoted
to it, that he has no Sense of the Eternity that is in him; that Eternity brought him
forth, and Eternity will take him again!

[Way-3-40] Theophilus.
It is true, Academicus, that the highest Good of this World is its bestial Life;
and therefore it has no more, or other, Happiness for a Man than for a Beast; can give no
more to one, than to the other; viz. Food and Raiment; with which the bestial Life
in Man ought to be content, as well as in the Beast. But seeing Man, in spite of the
Nature of Things, will have an earthly Glory of Life; thence it is, that the Wisdom of
this World is, and must be, Foolishness with God, and will be Foolishness with Man, as
soon as he gets but a moderate Knowledge of himself. But give me leave just to observe,
that though this material World has no higher Happiness than the bestial Life; yet God
hath much higher Ends in creating it. For though the dark wrathful Properties of fallen
Nature could only, in their Compaction, be made the Ground of a vegetable and bestial
Life; yet you are to observe, that in the Creation of this World; viz.in the
Compaction of the whole angelic Kingdom; the unspoiled heavenly Part thereof was shut
up with that, in which the Wrath was kindled: And that for these two great Ends; First,
That, by this Compaction, it might be taken out of the Power of the evil Angels, that they
might not go on in kindling Wrath in it. Secondly, That this reserved good Part of
their Kingdom might be the Foundation and Ground of an heavenly paradisiacal Life, and a
new Host of heavenly Creatures, instead of the fallen Angels. Now, to do this, God created
an human Angel, who was to call forth the paradisiacal Life out of the compacted heavenly
Substantiality, as the Sun opened a vegetable bestial Life, out of the gross
Substantiality of the material World.

[Way-3-41] God breathed the
Triune Spirit of the holy Deity into a Body taken out of the Earth, that is, into a Body
of that Heavenly Substantiality, that was shut up in the Earth, as well as in every
other part of this material System; and therefore his Body is rightly said to be taken or
formed out of the Earth; because it was formed of that Substantiality, that was shut up in
the Earth.

[Way-3-42] But when his
wandering Eye had raised a longing Desire to know what the earthly Life was in its Good
and Evil, and took the certain Means of knowing it; then, as his Soul lost the Light and
Spirit of God, so it lost also that heavenly luminous Body, in which the Light and Spirit
of God could dwell, as it dwelleth in Heaven. And when this heavenly luminous Corporeity
was lost, and shut up again in that earthly Bondage and Compaction, in which it lay,
before it was his Body; then the poor fallen Soul was only clothed with the gross
Corruptibility of bestial Flesh and Blood. You are to understand this Matter thus: when
his Body was formed out of that heavenly Substantiality, that was in the Compaction of the
Earth, it was not entirely separated from all earthly Materiality (because he was to have
a Body of this World, as well as of the heavenly World); but its State in the
earthly Materiality was entirely changed; it was till then shut up in the earthly
Compaction, but now it is called out of that earthly Death into a State of Life; it is set
free from the Power of the Earth, in a Superiority over it, to be its Happiness, and open
its own Glory in it, and through it.

[Way-3-43] And thus you see
the Possibility, the Truth, and the Manner of the Thing; how his
heavenly Body was taken out of the Earth at his Creation, set in Freedom from it, and in a
living Superiority over it; how, at the Fall, it was swallowed up, or compacted again in its
own first Earth; viz. the earthly Body, or Materiality of Adam: For as it was
not separated from this earthly Materiality, but only brought to Life in it, and
Superiority over it; so when the Divine Light, which was the Life of this Body, was lost,
it then fell again into a State of Death in that gross Materiality, under which it lay
before. And thus, in the strictest Truth, the Body of Adam returned again to that
very Earth, or Dust, from whence it was taken.

[Way-3-44] Now, when this
happened, the fallen Angels entered again into some Power in their lost Kingdom. There was
then something found, with which they could work, and join their own Power. For as the
Soul of Man had lost the Light and Spirit of Heaven, so the same dark Centre of
Nature, or the Three first wrathful Properties, were opened in it, as are opened in the
fallen Angels. And thus they got Entrance into the awakened Hell in Man, and can work in
it. For as often as Man stirred, followed, or worked with his Will according to these
Properties, the Devil could enter into, and work with him; and so the first Son of fallen
Man was made a Murderer. And hence it is, that Sin and Wickedness have known no Bounds; it
is because it is the joint Work of fallen Angels, and fallen Man.

[Way-3-45] Stay a while,
Sir, in View of these Truths: Here you see the Seat and Ground, the Birth and Growth of
all Sin and Evil; it lies in these Three dark, selfish, self-willed, wrathful, hellish
Properties of the fallen Soul. This is the dark Centre of Nature, in which the
Devils have all their own Power in themselves, and all their Power in you; and till you
resist this Hell within you,till you live in Contrariety to it, the Devils will not
flee from you.

[Way-3-46] Here also you
see, in a self-evident Light, the deep Ground, and absolute Necessity, of that one
Redemption, which is called, and is, the Meekness and heavenly Blood of the Lamb of God.
For these Words in their true Ground mean only the Changing of the Three first dark
wrathful Properties of fallen Nature, into the Three last Properties of the heavenly Life,
Light, and Love, which is the Life of God restored to the Soul, or the Light, and Spirit,
or Word of God born again in it. Let me only add this one Word; Turn from Wrath of every
Kind, as you would flee from the most horrid Devil; for it is his, it is he, and his
Strength in you. Whether you look at Rage and Anger in a Tempest, a Beast, or a Man, it is
but one and the same Thing, from one and the same Cause; and therefore your own Wrath is
to be turned from, as the same with that of Hell; and which has its Birth and Strength
from that Hell or Centre of Nature, which the Fall of Angels hath made known; and which
only worketh thus differently, whether it be in a Man, a Beast, or the Elements of this
World. And this must be, till the Centre of Nature is again in its Place of Hiddenness, by
being wholly overcome by Heaven. Embrace therefore every Meekness of Love and Humility
with the same Eagerness as you would fall down at the Feet of Jesus Christ; for it
is his, it is he, and his Power of Salvation in you. Enter into no Strife, or Self-defence
against any one, that either reproaches you, or your Doctrine; but remember, that if you
are to join with Christ in doing Good, your Sword of natural Wrath must be locked
up in its own Sheath; no Weapons of the Flesh are to be used; but you must work only in
the Meekness, the Sweetness, the Humility, the Love and Patience of the Lamb of God; who,
as such, is the only Doer of Good, the only Overcomer of Wrath, and the one Redemption of
fallen Nature. If you are reproached as an Enthusiast, do not take Comfort in
thinking, that it is the Truth of your own Piety, or the Want of it in others, that gives
Occasion to the Charge; for though both of these should happen to be the Case, yet they
are not proper Reflections for you; and if you take your Peace from them, it is not the
peace of God in you: But as in good Report, you are to be as though you heard it not,
ascribe nothing to yourself from it; so in evil Report, Self is just as much to be
forgotten; and both of them are to be used, only as an Occasion to generate Humility,
Meekness, Love, and the Spirit of the Lamb of God, both in yourself, and all that speak
either well or ill of you. For this is the Will and Working of Heaven; it has but one
Will, and one Work; and that is, to change all the Wrath, Evil, and Disorder of Nature,
into a Kingdom of God. And therefore he that would be a Servant of God, and work with
Heaven, must will all that he willeth, do all that he doth, and bear all that he beareth,
in that one Spirit, and one Will, with which Heaven ruleth over all the Earth.

[Way-3-47] You rejoice to
think, that you know the true Ground of your Redemption; how Heaven comes again into the
fallen Soul, when that Property of Light and Love, which is called the Fifth
Property of Nature, is generated in it. It is indeed a blessed Knowledge; but its
Blessedness is only then yours, when yourself are this Fifth Property, that is,
when your Life is a Life of this fifth Property; when, whatever you do, wherever you go,
or whatever you meet, you only do as this Fifth Property doth, give nothing but that which
it giveth; viz. its gentle Light and Love to every Man, and every Thing, whether it
be good or bad. For this Property hath nothing else to give, and yet is always giving; its
Nature is, to communicate and impart itself, not here or there, but always and
every-where; it has no other Will. When therefore this Property (the Christ of God,
and the Life of Heaven) is born in you, Friend and Foe will have the same from you; you
will have lost all Resentment; you will love your Enemies; bless them that curse you; pray
for them that despitefully use you; and have but one Will towards every Man, and that is,
that Light and Love may do that for him, which they have done for you.

[Way-3-48] Academicus.
Oh! Theophilus, you have given me more than I know how to contain; and yet have
increased my Thirst after more still. You have so touched the Cord of Love within me, that
all my Nature stands in a trembling Desire after it; I would fain feel nothing else but
the gentle godlike Power of Love, living in my Heart. Pray therefore, of all
Things, help me to understand how the Fire, the Fourth Property of Nature, is born; and
how it turns the first Three wrathful Forms into the Three following Forms of heavenly
Joy, Triumph, and Happiness; the First of which Three Forms, is this Fifth of Light
and Love: therefore, help me here, I beseech you.

[Way-3-49] Theophilus.
What a Therefore have you here drawn? That therefore, of all Things, I must need
help you to an Opinion, or notional Knowledge, how the Fire is born,
and how it turns Nature into a Kingdom of God. For was I to join with you in
forming Notions of thisHow, I should only help you to lose all, by being
content with the Shadow, instead of the Substance.

[Way-3-50] You say, that
your Nature stands in a trembling Desire after the Birth of this Light and Love: if so,
you stand in the very Place of its Birth, and must stand there till it is born in you. It
can be born nowhere else, nor in any other Manner; and all that Jacob Behmen has
written, is only to direct and bring you to this Place of its Birth. He himself has given
you all the hearsay Knowledge that you can have of it; for he can give you no more from
the plainest Words. And therefore, to help anyone to work with his Brain for clear
Notions, and rational Conceptions, of what he has written, is helping him to do and be
that, which all his Works, from the beginning to the End, absolutely declare against, as
contrary to the whole Nature and End of them. Which speak, as he saith, with the Sound of
a Trumpet; and chiefly to awaken Man out of the Dream and Death of rational, notional, and
hearsay Knowledge; and to show him, that his own inward Hunger and Thirst after God, is
that alone which can and must open the Fountain of Light and Divine Knowledge in him.

[Way-3-51] But to speak a
Word or Two of the Fire, whose Birth you want to know. You know already, better
than any Words can tell you, from a self-evident Knowledge, that Nature is in you;
that it is not God, but is that which wants God, or its true Good; and must
be an Emptiness, a Pain, and Want, till God is manifested in it. If you ask why Nature is
only a State of Want and Disquiet, and unable to be content with itself; it is because the
eternal, uncreated, incomprehensible Light, which no Creature can enter into, is that
which gave Birth to all Nature, and from whence all Nature hath its Hungering, and State
of Want. For Nature had never come into Being, but that the eternal, incomprehensible
Light longed to be manifested in an outspoken Life of Nature and Creatures, and in
a Visibility and Shine of Glory: therefore, as Nature came forth from this
first Longing of the Light to be manifested in it, so Nature is in itself only a Want and
Hungering, which the Light alone has raised, and can only satisfy.

[Way-3-52] Now from this
Longing on both Sides, Nature wanting God, and God wanting to be manifested in Nature, the
Union of both is effected, which is the Birth of that eternal Fire, or Fourth Form of
Nature, which is always burning in the same Degree, that is, always doing the same
Thing; viz. always overcoming and shutting up the Three first Forms of Nature, and
making them to be the hidden Root and Centre of Nature; and always bringing forth out of
them the Three following Properties of Light and Love, and every joyful Sensibility of
Life; that is, changing Nature into a Kingdom of Heaven. Now that which makes this
Change in the Properties of Nature is, and is rightly called, Fire, in the strictest
literal Meaning of the Word; because all that we can conceive as Fire in this World, hath
its whole Nature, Power, and Existence, from it. Not only the Fire of Life in Animals and
Vegetables, but the Fire in the Kitchen, and the Candle, are each of them kindled as it is
kindled, and doth all that it doth from this Fourth Property, or Fire of eternal Nature.
The Thickness and Darkness in the Wood, and the Candle, have Fire kindled in them, and
Light from that Fire, in no other Way, than as the Fourth Property is a Fire from the
Thickness and Darkness of Nature, kindled by the Light of God entering into Union with it.
Had the Wood, and the Candle, no Water or Oil in them, neither of them could
give forth Fire and Light. Now Water and Oil have the Properties of Light in them: when
therefore the Properties of Nature in the Wood, and the Candle, are put into Strife, and
begin to work in Blackness and Darkness(which is the Beginning of every Fire), they by
this Strife open an Entrance for the Properties of Light in the Water, and the Oil, to mix
and unite with them; and by this Union of Darkness and Light, that Fire is kindled, which
turns the Darkness of the Wood and Candle into a Shining and Light. And thus does every
Fire kindled in this World bear an infallible Witness to the Kindling, the Nature, and
Power, of that eternal Fire, which, kindled by the Oil of Divine Light, changes the first
dark Properties of Nature into the Light and Majesty of Heaven. Now what would you know
more of Fire, or its Birth, than that it is, and only can be, kindled by the Light of God
entering into, and uniting with, the first Properties of Nature in the Soul? Leave off
therefore all Working with your Reason in the Way of Notions; empty your Heart of all vain
Satisfactions in earthly Things, that so the first Properties of Nature in your Soul,
finding their Misery, and Want of God, may make you to be all Hunger, and Faith, and
Desire of him. And then the Fire must kindle, nothing can hinder it; God will then
infallibly come as a Fire and Light into your Soul, changing all the wanting, empty,
restless Properties of your natural Life, into a sweetness of a new Birth of Rest and
Peace in him.

[Way-3-53] For nothing works
either in God, or Nature, or Creature, but Desire. And as God created Angels and
Men out of eternal Nature, only through a longing Desire of manifesting his own Goodness
and Happiness in them, so every Angel and Man must find God, as a life of Happiness and
Goodness in him, as soon as Nature, either in Angel or Man, is become a Hunger after God.
For Hunger does all in all Worlds, and finds all that it wants, and hungers after. Every
Thing had its Beginning in it, and from it; and every Thing is led by it to all its
Happiness.

[Way-3-54] Academicus.
I am quite satisfied in all my Demands, and will ask for no more Help, as to the Use I am
to make of our Authors Writings. Only tell me when they will all come forth in a new
Edition, or which will be published first; for I want several of them, which I could never
get.

[Way-3-55] Theophilus.
If you have but Two or Three of his Books, it is enough; for every one of them has all in
it that you need be taught, and sufficiently opens the Ground of the whole Mystery of the
Christian Redemption. He himself thought his Books to be too numerous; and expressed his
Wish, that they were all reduced into one. As he wrote without any Art, and had no
Knowledge of Regularity of Composition; so whatever particular Matter he occasionally
entered upon, he always began again afresh from the same first Ground, and full Opening of
the Mystery of Nature, from whence he explained and determined the Matter he was upon. And
it was this frequent, and almost constant, Repetition of one and the same Ground that
swelled his Writings into so many Volumes; though it may be said, that there is nothing
separately in any of his Books, but what is to be found in almost every other, though not
so largely set forth. You have no need therefore to run with eagerness through all his
Books; but the Thing that you are to intend and look for, is the Ground and
Foundation on which all his Doctrines are built, which contains the true Philosophy, or fundamental
Opening of all the Powers that work both in Nature and Grace; and that by this
Knowledge you may become a true Workman yourself; and know how to conform to, and concur
with, all that the working Powers, either of Nature or Grace, require of you. Now this
Ground and Foundation of all is (as far as Words can do it) opened to you in every one of
his Books: And you have been already also sufficiently brought into the Knowledge of it,
by what has been said of the Birth of Nature; what it is, how it works, how it came
into Being, how it is distinct from God, how it wants God, how God is manifested in it,
how every After-thing is from and out of it, is all that it is, and hath all that it hath,
in it, and by it, and must have all its Happiness or Misery, according as it works with,
or contrary to Nature. From this fundamental Ground, or Opening of the working Powers of
Nature, you have seen how Angels could and did, lose their first State in Nature; and how
a Second new Creation could, and did come out of their fallen State and Kingdom, all
according to the Powers of fallen Nature, over-ruled, and governed, and put into a new Way
by the Good creating Fiat of God. You have seen how this new Creation, with Man its
Lord, could, and did, lose also their First created State in Nature; and how God,
over-ruling fallen Nature again, did, by his merciful redeeming Fiat, or by the
Means of the holy Jesus, put this fallen new Creation in a State of Recovery, and
all done according to the Powers, and Workings, and possibilities of Nature. So that
nothing is done arbitrarily, or by mere Will, but everything in Conformity to the
unchangeable Workings and Powers of Nature; only directed, assisted, and helped, by the
Mercy of his redeeming Fiat, so far as Nature was capable of being helped. This,
Sir, is the true and fundamental Ground of all his Doctrines; and, standing upon this
Ground, you stand in the Centre of Truth, whence every thing that you need to know of God,
of Nature, of Heaven, of Hell, of the Fall of Man, of his Redemption only and solely in
and by the Word or Son of God, is known in such self-evident Certainty, as you find and
know the Workings of your own Life: And also, that Happiness, or Misery, Life or Death,
can only be had, or not had, lost or found, solely as a Birth in Nature, brought
forth by the Faith, or magic Power of the Will of Man, working either with, or contrary
to, the redeeming Fiat of God.

[Way-3-56] To make
therefore a right Use of his Writings, you should, for a sufficient Time, keep solely to
that Part of them, which opens the Ground and Foundation of the Powers that work in Grace
and Nature, till by a self-evident Sensibility it is opened in you, and your Heart stands
in a Conformity to it, and true Working with it: for it is your own Heart, as finding the
working Powers of Nature and Grace in itself, and simply given up in Faith to work with
them, that is to be your Key and Guide to that Knowledge you are to have of them; whether
it be from the Holy Scripture, or the Writings of this Author. For to this End, he tells
you, he has written all; viz. to help Man to seek and find himself; what is
his Birth, his State and Place in Nature; what he is in Body, Soul, and Spirit; from what
Worlds all these Three Parts of him are come; how they came to be as they are at present;
what his Fall is, and how he must rise out of it. And therefore, if, in order to seek and
find this Ground in yourself, you were, for some sufficient time, to read only to the 10th
or 12th Chapter of his Three Principles, or to the 6th or 8th
Chapter of his Threefold Life; and proceed no farther, till this Ground had made
itself manifest in you, and your Heart stood in a strict Conformity to it, and Working
with it; you would then be in a true Fitness to read farther, and reap the full Benefit
from any other of his Books, that should fall into your Hands; whether it was the Way
to Christ, or the Book upon the Incarnation. But, above all Things, remember
this Advice, as of the last Moment to you, Be no Reasoner upon the Mystery; seek
for no Commentaries, or rational Explications of it, to entertain your Reason with: For,
as soon as you do this; then, however true and good this Mystery may be in itself, it is,
with regard to you, of no better Use than that very vain Philosophy, and Science
falsely so called, condemned by the Apostle. It will only be the same Snare and
Delusion to you, that other Learning and Philosophy is to other People. For if there is
nothing good or Divine in you but the Faith, and Hope, and Love, and Desire of your Heart
turned to God; if nothing can do any Good, be any Blessing or Happiness to this Faith, and
Love, and Desire turned to God, but only God himself in his holy Being; and if
nothing can communicate God to you, but God himself; and if God cannot communicate himself
to you under a Notion, or an Idea of Reason, but a Degree of Life, Good, and Blessing,
born or brought to Life in your Soul; then you see, that to give yourself up to Reasoning,
and notional Conceptions, is to turn from God, and wander out of the Way of all Divine
Communications.

[Way-3-57] Academicus.
But if it be strictly thus, Theophilus, had it not been better, that these deep
Matters had not been communicated to the World, since it is so natural to Man to make a
wrong Use of them?

[Way-3-58] Theophilus.
This Objection, Academicus, comes with the same Strength against the Scriptures
themselves. For, excepting the Seven thousands unknown in every Age, as in the Days
of Elijah, and a few spiritual Fathers and Writers in almost every Age of the
Church, bearing faithful Witness to the Truth and Mysteries of Religion, it must be said,
that human Learning, governed by human Reason, hath, from Age to Age, to this very Day,
not only mistaken the true End and Use of the Scriptures, but hath turned them into an
Occasion of much Evil and Mischief. The Scriptures speak only to the Heart and Conscience
of Man, not to amend or enlighten it with Notions and Opinions formed from the written
Letter of the Word; but solely to make the Being and Power of God known and
adored, and to awaken in Man a Sensibility of his Want of God; and to turn all the Power,
and Strength, and Will of the Heart wholly to God, to receive Light, and Life, and Rest,
in his holy Being.

[Way-3-59] But to speak now
directly to your Objection: if I knew of any Person, who stood in the Faith and Simplicity
of the first Christians, free from all carnal Adherence, or vain Trust, to Party-Notions,
Doctrines, and Errors, brought forth by the Contention of Sects and Churches; whose Soul
was dead to the earthly Nature, and all the Rudiments of this World, seeking only Light,
Life, and Salvation, from God the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, living and dwelling in him,
redeeming and sanctifying his whole Body, Soul, and Spirit; To such a one I could freely
say, this Mystery was needless; as having all that already which this Mystery would do for
him. For its only End is, to bring Man out of all the Labyrinths of false and notional
Religion, to this very first State and Simplicity of the Gospel-Faith and Life.

[Way-3-60] And this may
Pass for a good Reason why this Mystery was not opened by God in the first Ages of the
Church; since there was then no Occasion for it. For Religion began, and went on, rightly,
in its own true Way; it had the Faith and Heart of Man; it stood in its own proper
Strength and Glory, and was an awakened Divine Life of Faith simply given up with Joy and
Gladness to the Mysteries of the Gospel; not wanting any Why's or Wherefore's,
because in the real Possession of all the Good, and Blessing, and Power,
of every Mystery of Salvation.

[Way-3-61] But seeing a worldly
Spirituality, called in the Scripture the Whore riding upon the Beast, has had
its Thousand Years in the Church; since not only every Kingdom, but almost every Corner of
Christendom, has a Babel of its own, built upon some rational Interpretation of the
Letter of Scripture; since learned Reason, within the Church, knows no other Use of
Scriptures, but to reproach and condemn all other Babels, and to find Materials to
strengthen its own; since Reason, without the Church, finds it as easy to reproach and
condemn all Revelation, as it is to reproach all these Babels built upon it; since
this is the finished Confusion, brought forth by the Reason and fleshly Wisdom
both of those that defend, and those that oppose the Gospel; how adorable is the Goodness
of God in vouchsafing to these last Ages of the World such a Remedy (viz., the
Opening the Ground and Mystery of all things) as is suitable to the distressed and
confused State of Religion in the World! And how easy is it also to see the greatest
Reasons, why this Remedy was not afforded sooner! For as true Faith did not want it, and
learned Reason, whilst pleased with itself, could not be in a Condition to receive it; so
it was highly suitable to the Goodness and Wisdom of God, not to give forth this Mystery,
till Reason, or fleshly Wisdom, had made Shipwreck of Faith; and had so filled up the
measure of its Folly, as to stand in its last and highest State of Distress, Perplexity,
and Confusion. For any Remedy is only then likely to be rightly received, when distress
and perplexity makes the Want of it to be sensibly felt.

[Way-3-62] Let not
therefore the genuine, plain, simple Christian, who is happy and blessed in the Simplicity
of Gospel-Faith, take Offence at this Mystery, because he has no Need of it. For it is
God's Goodness to the distressed State of the Church, fallen from the Life and Power of
Gospel-Faith, and groaning under the Slavery, Darkness, and Perplexity of bewildered
Reason and Opinions.

[Way-3-63] Neither let the
orthodox Divine, who sticks close to the Phrases and Sentiments of Antiquity, reject this
Mystery as heretical, because it opens a Ground of Man, and the Divine Mysteries, not
known or found in the primitive Writers. For this is the very Reason, why he should
thankfully receive it with open Arms, as having, and being that very Thing, which the
distressed divided State of the Church now so greatly wants; and yet did not want, till it
was fallen from its first Simplicity of Faith. For whilst Faith and Life defended the
Mysteries of Religion, the Ground and Philosophy of it was not wanted. But when Orthodoxy
had given itself up to Reason, and had nothing else for its Support but Reason and
Argument from the Letter of Scripture, without the least Knowledge of the first Ground of
Doctrines; then it could only be defended, as it is defended in every Sect and Division of
the Christian World. For if Reason will defend the Mysteries of Redemption, without
knowing the true Ground on which they stand, or why they must be as they are, from the
Nature of the Thing; the more zealous and learned any Man is, the more Errors must he fall
into in the Defence of them. For the greater the Strength is, that Works without Light,
the more Extravagancies it must produce. This is too visible in all the Controversies that
have risen in the Church. Now, that learned Reason, as presiding in the Divinity-Schools,
never yet had, nor could have, any Knowledge of the Ground of Man, and the Mysteries of
Redemption, is plain from this one generally received Opinion of every age to this Day; viz.
That all Things were created out of Nothing. For this Maxim entirely excludes all
Possibility of giving any Account of the Ground and Reason of any thing, either in the
Nature of Man, or Religion; and is the same Thing as saying, that Nothing has any Ground
or Reason. For if that which begins to be comes out of Nothing, it can only have the
Nature of that out of which it comes; and therefore can have no more said about it, why it
is this or that, than can be said of that Nothing, from whence it comes. And if the
Mystery, or Life of the human Nature, is out of Nothing, has no Reality of any antecedent
Ground in it, out of which it came to be such as it is, and to have that which it hath;
then it is most certain, that all the Mysteries of the Religion of Man must come forth
from the same Nothing, and have no antecedent Ground from whence they come, that
requires them to be as they are. For Man, created out of Nothing, cannot have a Religion
that is of any higher Descent than himself, unless he is to have a Religion that is quite
unnatural to him. But a Religion that has its Ground in Eternity, must be an unnatural
Religion to Man that comes up in Time, and out of Nothing. If therefore you will hold Man
to be out of Nothing, you must of all Necessity hold all the Mysteries of the Religion of
Man to be also out of Nothing; and that therefore no possible Account can be given either
of the Ground of Man, or his Religion, or why there can be either Right or Wrong, Good or
Evil, in either of them.

[Way-3-64] Hence you may
see why the Truth has always suffered in every Controversy of the Church: Thus, if you
begin with that of St. Austin and Pelagius, about the Freedom of the human
Will; do but suppose, what is Fact that they both of them held the human Will to be
created out of Nothing; and then you need not wonder at that Number of Volumes and Systems
of Errors, which this Dispute has brought forth. For who can say, what the Will is, or is
not; what Nature or Power it must have, if it is created out of Nothing? Whereas, if
either of these Disputants had known, from a true Ground, what the human Will is; that it
cannot be a made Thing, much less made out of Nothing; but that the Will of Angel or Man
is the eternal uncreated Will become creaturely, as a true direct Birth from the Divine
Will, descended from it, born out of it, and from thence come into a creaturely State;
then they had known, that the Will of Angel or Man must have the Nature and Freedom of the
eternal Will; and that its Freedom not only consisted in its Self-motion, but chiefly and
most gloriously in this, that it could neither receive, nor have, nor be anything, as to
its Happiness or Misery, but according to its own Working: And then all that
Predestinarian Learning of Decrees, &c. that has tormented the Church ever
since the time of St. Austin, had been prevented.

[Way-3-65] Look next at the
Socinian Controversy. The Socinians, and their Opponents, met in the Field of
Reason, to debate about the Fall, Original Sin, its Guilt, the vindictive Wrath of God,
and the Necessity of satifsfying the Divine Justice; the Necessity of the Incarnation,
Sufferings, Death, and Satisfaction, of Christ. These were the great Points to be tried at
the Bar of Reason. Now all these Disputants stood upon the old Ground; viz. that
the Soul of Man, as well as all other Things, was created out of Nothing. And therefore,
they all stood absolutely excluded from every Possibility of touching the true Ground or
Reason of any one Doctrine in Debate. For the Soul, created out of Nothing, leaves no room
to affirm, or even to suppose, that anything can be affirmed of the Ground and Reason of
Christian Redemption. For surely, if the Soul of Man is created out of Nothing, it may and
must with as much Sense be affirmed, that it may be redeemed by Nothing; and he
that affirms the one, can have no Pretence to deny the other.

[Way-3-66] Just the same
may be said of the present Controversy betwixt the Christians and Infidels, concerning
Christianity itself. You need not wonder, that so many learned Volumes have had so little
Effect; or that the Defenders of Christianity seem to lose Ground, though the Infidels, at
the same time, get no Advantage to their Cause, but that of increasing their Numbers. For
as neither Side can go any higher, than a Creation out of Nothing; so neither Side can say
any thing from a true Ground, either for or against the Mysteries of the Gospel. If
therefore Infidelity increases, it is not because it has got more Light, sees further into
the Depths of Nature, or stands upon a more rational Ground; but merely because the Vanity
and Blindness of the Dispute has a natural Tendency to beget Indifference and Infidelity
in the Hearts of Men.

[Way-3-67] Observe this
Proposition; viz.In God we live and have our Being. Now, how easy is it for
any one to see, that no one can say any thing as to the Ground and Reasons of the
Mysteries of the Gospel, either for or against them, till he can go to the Bottom of this
Proposition, and plainly show, either how we do, or do not, live and move, and have our
Being in God! For the Truth or Falseness of every Mystery of the Christian Redemption
plainly depends upon this Matter. If the Christian therefore will speak to the Purpose, in
Defence of the Ground of the Gospel; he must be able to show, that we so are in God, so
have our Life in him and from him, and to move in him, as to prove, from thence, the
Ground, the Necessity, and Certainty, of the Christian Means of Redemption. On the other
hand, the Deist cannot take one rational Step, or have any true Ground to stand upon, but
so far as he can show, that we are not so from God, have not such a Nature in and from
him, do not so live and move in him, as to have any Want or any Fitness for
that Method of Redemption, which the Gospel teaches. But as neither Side did this, though
the one Thing necessary to be done; so you also see, that neither Side had any Possibility
of Doing it. For the Soul, created out of Nothing, allows of no Inquiry, whether any thing
of God be in it, or how it has its Life in him, or stands related to him. It admits of no
searching after any Ground or Reason of its Good or Evil, or how it must have its
Happiness or Misery from the Nature of the Thing. For if the intelligent Life
itself must be supposed to come from no Ground, but to be created out of Nothing; then it
is certain, that its Good and Evil, its Happiness or Misery, with every thing else, must
be supposed to have no Ground or Reason for being as it is, but to be created out of
Nothing; and may go again into Nothing, just as the Creator pleaseth.

[Way-3-68] And now, Sir,
you may enough see, how all Controversy, both within and without the Church, has been so
vain a thing. For Reason was to support Doctrines and Mysteries, without the least
Knowledge of the Ground on which they stood; and Reason was to oppose them in the same
Ignorance. You see also, why in these last Ages, where literal Learning has made so great
a Figure, that the Matter has only been made worse, and Division and Error more
triumphant. For as the Ground of the Truth was still wanted, and nothing appealed to, but
the Letter and Phrase of Scripture; so the more artful and learned the Disputants were in
Reasoning and Criticism, the more Absurdities must be defended on both Sides. Why is not
the learned Papist shocked at Transubstantiation, or the Protestant at Predestination and
Reprobation? It is because each of them have enough of the Truth of Reason, and the
Goodness of Criticism, to draw the Letter of Scripture to his Side. And this you
may be assured of, that Reason, and literal Learning, have just as good Eyes in every
other religious Matter, and will give just such an Account of every other Doctrine, when
it comes into Dispute, as the Papist and Protestant have done in these two Points. And the
thing cannot be otherwise: As Deist and Christian both hold a Creation out of Nothing,
they must both have only an arbitrary God, and arbitrary Religion, that has no antecedent
Ground to stand upon, but is left to the arbitrary Proof or Reason of both of them. What
Thanks, therefore, are due to the Goodness of God, for opening this great Mystery of all
Things in our Author, wherein the Right and Wrong, the True and False, in Religion, is as
manifest as any thing can be to our Senses! Let no one therefore take Offence at the
Opening of this Mystery, as if it brought any thing new into Religion; for it has nothing
new in it; it alters no Point of Gospel-Doctrine, nor adds any thing to it, but only sets
every Article of the old Christian Faith upon its true Ground, and in such a Degree of
Light, as, when seen, is irresistible. It disturbs no one, who is in Possession of the
Truth, because it points at nothing, drives to nothing, but to the opening the heavenly
Life in the Soul. It calls no Man from any outward Form of Religion, as such; but only
shows, that no outward Form can have any Good in it, but so far as it only means, and
seeks, and helps, the renewed Life of Heaven in the Soul. A Christian, says he, is
of no Sect, and yet in every Sect; a Truth which all Sects, as such, will dislike; and
therefore a Truth equally wanted to be known, and equally beneficial to all Sects. For the
chief Hurt of a Sect lies in this, that it takes itself to be necessary to the Truth;
whereas the Truth is only then found, when it is known to be of no Sect, but as free and
universal as the Goodness of God, and as common to all Names and Nations as the Air and
Light of this World.

[Way-3-69] Suffer me now,
before we part, once more to repeat what I have so often said, that you would not receive
this Mystery as a System of rational Notions; nor do with it, as the World has, for the
most part, done with the Bible, only gather opinions of Reason and Speculation from it.
For it opens no Depth of Nature or Grace, but to help you to the Heart and Spirit of the
returning prodigal Son, and to show you the Blindness and Vanity of Reason and Opinions;
and that Truth can have no possible Entrance into you, but so far as you die to your
earthly Nature. The Gospel saith all this to you in the plainest Words; and the Mystery
only shows you, that the whole System of the Universe saith the same thing. To be a true
Student or Disciple of the Mystery, is to be a Disciple of Christ; for it calls you to
nothing but to the plain Letter of the Gospel; and wherever it enters, either into the
Height or Depth of Nature, it is only to confirm the Truth of these Words of Christ;
viz.He that followeth not me, walketh in Darkness; And unless a Man deny himself,
and forsake all that he hath, he cannot be my Disciple. This is the Philosophy opened
in this Mystery. It is not to lead you after itself, but to compel you, by every Truth of
Nature, to turn to Christ, as the one Way, the one Truth, the one Life, and
Salvation of the Soul; not as notionally apprehended, or historically known; but as
experimentally found, living, speaking, and working, in your Soul. Read as long or as much
as you will of this Mystery, it is all Labour lost; if you intend any thing else by it, or
would be any thing else from it, but a Man dead to this World, that you may live unto God
through Christ Jesus, in the Power of Faith, and the Spirit of Prayer. With these
Words upon our Minds, my Friends, let us now end this Conversation.

PTW's 1998 HTML, on-line version
of William Law's The Way to Divine Knowledge was derived using (with permission)
Warner Whites painstakingly transcribed ASCII electronic text (produced in 1995 by White, who worked from the
modernized 1974 Georg Olms Verlag [Hildesheim NewYork ] edition of The Works of the
Reverend William Law]. PTW volunteers
added the formatting and emphatic use to return this manuscript to its
"close-to-original" look and content, just as it was published in a 1893reprint
of the 1752 edition. Typographical errors, changed and omitted text that were discovered
in Whites version have also been corrected as well. Except for the numbering [in
square brackets] of the paragraphs (which did not appear in the original), the
on-line rendering here at Pass the WORD is a reproduction of the much older, unedited 1752
edition.